The present invention relates generally to a rear holder for a connector. More particularly, the present invention relates to a rear holder which can be used on both a female connector housing and a male connector housing for use in a so-called hybrid connector having plural kinds of terminals, each being of the same size and each immovably received in terminal receiving chambers in a connected state relative to opponent cables.
A rear holder for a connector includes a plurality of partition pieces corresponding to an arrangement of plural kinds of terminals immovably received in terminal receiving chambers in a connected state relative to opponent cables, and each partition piece defines a row of cables connected to the terminals. In addition, the rear holder is used for preventing the terminals from being disconnected from the connector housing in a rearward direction while the rear holder is fitted to a rear end part of a female connector housing or a male connector housing.
A conventional rear holder of the foregoing type is practically employed in a so-called hybrid connector having plural kinds of terminals, each having a same size, received in terminal receiving chambers in a form of a single block in the connected state relative to opponent cables.
Specifically, this hybrid connector includes a connector housing in which terminal receiving chambers having terminals connected to large size cables received therein and terminal receiving chambers having terminals connected to small size cables received therein are formed. Since the length of each terminal having a large diameter is different from the length of each terminal having a small diameter, stepped parts are formed in a rear holder receiving chamber for receiving a rear holder corresponding to the sizes of the terminals. On the other hand, the rear holder is designed to exhibit a contour coincident with that of the stepped parts on the housing 1 side so as to allow the rear holder to be fitted into the rear holder chamber. With this construction, desired effects expected from the connector are effectively obtainable by fitting the rear holder into the rear holder receiving chamber.
To assure that malfunctions do not arise, such as the connected terminals being disconnected from the connector housing in the rearward direction or the terminals being incorrectly inserted into the corresponding terminal receiving chamber, the rear holder is designed to exhibit a contour coincident with that of each stepped part on the housing side in the above-described manner. For this reason, in cases where the contour of each stepped part varies to some extent, especially in the case where the contour of a fitting portion on the female connector housing or the male connector housing is modified, there arises a necessity for fabricating another rear holder to cope with the foregoing variation or modification.
Consequently, the number of dies for molding rear holders is increased, resulting in an undesirably increased production cost for each connector housing. In addition, other problems include: the amount of time required for achieving a preparative operation is increased due to an increase in the number of components in the final state of the connector housing assembled with the rear holder, an inventory controlling operation for storing various kinds of components becomes complicated, and the production cost of each molded article is substantially increased.
In the case where the rear holder is employed with a connector having a special contour, the rear holder cannot be practically used as a common component irrespective of the contour of each stepped part on the connector housing side.